When negotiating a contract candidate’s pay rate, it may feel like you are between a rock and a hard place. After all, both the client and the candidate are your customers. You have to make your client happy if you hope to get future job orders, and a satisfied candidate will likely turn to you for future contract opportunities and may even refer friends looking for contract work.

So where do you start? A common rule of thumb is to divide the annual salary for a comparable direct…